The Web Marketing Mix model identifies the online marketing critical elements and addresses the main ECommerce strategic, operational and organisational
issues in an integrated and manageable manner. The WMM is an appropriate basis for the Web Strategic and Marketing planning, especially intended for click-and mortars operating in the in the Business-to-Consumer segment.The tool is designed primarily for conventional, physical corporations planning to establish an Internet presence. The model can be also useful to pure-plays or existing online organisations in reevaluating their E-Commerce presence, provided that such organisations already have or are considering having a physical presence next to the virtual one.

The Web Marketing Mix approaches the marketing planning process in an integral manner, on different levels:

Strategic Level of Web Marketing

On strategic level the model identifies the main strategic issues to be addressed in order to build up a flexible, value adding and potentially successful ECommerce organisation. The model emphasises the fact that online activities should be assigned their own strategic objectives in line with the corporate ones. Next to that it recommends the highest possible assimilation of the online venture into the physical corporate commercial strategy in order to capitalise on the existing organisation’s strengths and competitive advantages.

Operational Level of Web Marketing

On operational level the WMM proposes a method for drafting realistic and consistent Web marketing plans. The prime objective of the operational planning is the development of a market-oriented, effective, flexible and
unique online presence.

Organisational Level of Web Marketing

On organisational level the WMM addresses the issue of building up the proper organisational, human and knowledge infrastructure necessary for a smooth online operation. The model identifies areas where a high degree of integration of the virtual business into the corporate infrastructure is necessary in order to maximise the synergies between the virtual and physical business and improve the overall organisational efficiency.

Next to these three main focus areas the WMM denotes the need for further improving the competitiveness of the online organisation by seeking synergies with “complementors” i.e. third parties or industries. These complementary firms have been recommended by Shapiro and Varian (1999) [46] as the sixth force to be added to Porter’s five competitive forces model in order to fully understand the competitive strength and competitive position of firms operating in information markets.

Finally the model identifies the main technological and administrative issues that will underpin E-Commerce activities.

The above mentioned issues describe the successive steps of the Web commercial planning methodology and are classified in four groups. Each group is labelled by a word beginning with the letter S namely the Scope, Site, Synergy and System (Exhibit 1). The content of each Sgroup is based on the previous steps but feedback during the planning process is necessary for fine-tuning of each step. The final result – the Web Strategic and Marketing Plan – will become the basis of the Internet project, the groundwork of a process including several more stages: the development of the technical and organisational infrastructure, the technical implementation, the testing of processes and the commercialisation of the Web site. Finally, it should be mentioned that the fast changing character of the Web makes it imperative that the planing procedure is frequently repeated – the frequency depending on the branch, the market developments and the competitive reactions – in order to maintain the
competitive advantage of the online organisation overtime.

Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence is the most tricky, robust and clever technique that is completely transforming the current trends of human computer interaction to a totally new era of intelligence. The era in which computers will play a vital role and will behave exactly similar to human beings. The concept of AI was first proposed on the campus of Darmouth College in the summer of 1956. Those who attended that conference would become the leaders of AI research for decades. Many researchers had contributed into this concept of making computer behave just like human beings. Three major techniques are conclusively evolved under this concept of Artificial Intelligence.

1)      Supervised Learning

2)      Un-Supervised Learning

3)      Re-Enforcement Learning

The Concept of Supervised learning is defined as a concept in which the target is known and the software learns on the basis of change in weights which occurred by subtracting output from target and calculating errors. As soon as the error is minimized we successfully reach the target. The most popular network used in this regard is neural network and two types of algorithms are used in this case 1) Perceptron Learning Algorithm 2) Back Propagation Algorithm.

The Concept of Unsupervised Learning is defined as a concept in which the target is unknown and the software learns on the basis of weight between an input neuron and an output neuron when an input neuron’s activation passes forward to the output neuron and causes the output neuron to fire strongly. The types of learning used in this case will be hebian learning and Competitive Learning and the network most popularly used is neural network whereas the algorithm used in this case is mostly feed forward algorithm.

“ When an axon of a cell A is near enough to excite a cell B and repeatedly or persistently takes part in firing it, some growth process or metabolic change takes place in one or both cells such that A’s efficiency as one of the cells firing B is increased. “

The concept of Re-Enforcement learning is appropriate for an AI agent or agent which is actively exploring what actions are best to take in different situations. Reinforcement learning is so-called because, when an AI performs a beneficial action, it receives some reward which reinforces its tendency to perform that beneficial action.

CUSTOMER CONVENIENCE

The most popular invention of 20^th as well as 21^st century is internet. Internet has introduced so many new words of technology like e-commerce, e-business, m-commerce etc. that people nowadays requires it as the most important necessity of their life. The fact of increase in the number of users of internet is making internet research more and more active day by day. People are working and trying to devise new ways to make internet more secure, intelligent, reliable, user-friendly, and most importantly very specific. The concept of making internet more specific or personalized to every individual emerged the concept of Web Personalization (Vazirgiannis, 2003). Web Personalization is a technique of making web portals intelligent in a sense that based on previous implicit and explicit historical record keeping related to behavioral personas (Tanudjaja, 2002), browsing information (Balabanovic, 1995), feedback information and all other experiences of any user’s visit, different methods of record filtration are performed and then personalized recommendations are given to the visitor during their future visits on the web. This makes every user’s page personalized to his/her preference of usage.

Providing Customer Convenience Through Web Personalization

GENDER DIFFERENCE

Behavioral and feminist theories of women’s greater vulnerability to depressive symptoms compared with that of men generally attribute this vulnerability to the negative consequences of women’s lower social status and power (Bandura, 1986; Miller, 1976; Radloff, 1975; Seligman, 1975). Because of this lower status and power, women experience more negative events and have less control over important areas of their lives than men. A host of specific negative life events or circumstances have been proposed to play a role in the greater vulnerability to depression of women than of men (Gender) (for reviews, see McGrath et al., 1990, and Nolen-Hoeksema, 1990). Some of the most frequently cited include work overload and unequal power and status in heterosexual relationships. Although women may make less money than men, they appear to work more hours per week than men when all the roles that they perform are considered. Women often work full time in the paid workforce and do nearly all the child care and domestic work of the home (Barnett, Brennan, & Marshall, 1994; Crosby, 1982).

(Gender Difference Description)

In addition, women are increasingly “sandwiched” between caring for young children and caring for sick and older family members. This work overload is proposed to contribute to a sense of burnout and general distress, including depressive symptoms, in women (Gove & Tudor, 1973; Hobfoll, 1991; Mclntosh, Keywell, Reifman,& Ellsworth, 1994).Another chronic strain for women may be that they do not feel valued for who they are or for their roles in their partnerships and families (Jack, 1991; Miller, 976). They may “silence” their opinions and desires in favor of keeping a positive emotional tone in their relationships Both Gender Have Fun (Helgeson, 1994; Jack, 1991).

Gender Desire

When they do try to voice their opinions and desires, they may feel unappreciated or unheard.How would these negative circumstances lead to depression in women? Behavioral and cognitive theories of depression have suggested that a chronic lack of control over their environment leads people to develop a generalized expectation that they cannot control events; this situation then leads to the symptoms of depression lowered motivation, passivity, self-esteem loss, and the inability to see opportunities to control the environment (Bandura,1977; Lewinsohn, Hoberman, Teri, & Hautzinger, 1985; Seligman,1975). The generalized expectation of no control has been labeled learned helplessness (Seligman, 1975), low self-efficacy (Bandura,1977), and low mastery (Dweck, 1975; Pearlin & Schooler, 1978).In keeping with feminist theories, Nolen-Hoeksema (1987,1991) has argued that women’s lack of social power also contributes to their tendency to engage in rumination more than men when distressed. Rumination involves passively and repetitively focusing on one’s symptoms of distress (“I’m so tired,” “I’m so unmotivated”) and on the meanings and consequences of the distress (“What’s wrong with my life” “My boss is going to get annoyed if I keep missing deadlines”). Both questionnaire studies and laboratory studies have found that women are more likely than men to ruminate and focus on emotion when sad or depressed (cf. Butler & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1994, Nolen-Hoeksema, Morrow, & Fredrickson, 1993, and Nolen-Hoeksema, Parker, & Larson,1994). Women may ruminate more because they are searching for ways in which they can control their environment and their distress but do not feel efficacious about exerting that control and thus remain stuck in rumination. In turn, a number of laboratory and field studies have shown that people who engage in rumination when distressed show longer and more severe periods of depressive symptoms and are more likely to develop full depressive disorders than those who do not engage in rumination (Alloy & Abramson, 1997; Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1991; Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1993; Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1994).In sum, several theories suggest that the greater experience of negative life events of women than of men may lead both to low mastery and to rumination; these, in turn, contribute to more depression in women than in men.

Please comment on Gender Difference

Interpretive research is founded on the assumption that knowledge is gained or at least filtered through social construction such as language, awareness, and shared meanings. This research methodology acknowledges the close relationship between the researchers and what is being explored and the situational constraints shaping this process. Interpretive research does not predefine dependent or independent variables. It does not set out to test theories but aims to produce an understanding of the social context of the phenomenon and the process where the phenomenon influences and is influenced by the social context (Walsham 1995). An interpretive study also focuses on the human aspect (Rowlands B. 2005). The research is a product of interpretations, interventions and individual decisions, where the researchers try to understand the phenomenon by accessing the meanings that the participant assigns to them. Positivist supposed believes that reality is separate from the individual who observes it whereas interpretevist believes that reality and the individual who observe cannot be separated (Heinz K.Klien 1999). Positivist try to build knowledge of a reality that exist beyond the human mind whereas interpretevist recognize that knowledge they build reflect their particular goals (E.Husseri and D.Carr 1970/1936). Positivist supposed believe that the object they research have qualities that exist independent of th0065 researcher whereas interpretevist believes that the qualities in their research are social constructiveness and they claimed their research as the product of their life (Thomas S.Kuhn 1970). Normally positivist tend to use laboratories experiments, field experiments, and surveys whereas interpretevist uses cases studies, ethnographic studies, phenomenographic studies and ethnomethodological studies as their preferred research methods (Mats Alvesson and Kaj Sk ldberg 200). Inorder to understand the social grounds of the world the strategies of interpretivism will be the key to discover knowledge (Gareth Morgan 1989). if one need the revolutionize the whole scientific structure then it can be attained through interpretivism (Thomas Kuhn 1970).On the other side if one need to qualify or quantify the information gained from many respondents then it would be complex and difficult under interpretive paradigm (Matveev 2002). Lastly but not least the major strength as far as collection of data is concerned in interpretive study is through case study (Yin 2003) that allows the researchers to understand the problem, the nature and complexity of the process and the valuable insight of rapidly changing world.

“Merry Christmas”

The reason why I am writing this article to make all of you aware of the importance about this event in regards to money making online. This month will be the most crowded month on the internet as compared to others. People will try to Google different products on the internet like Christmas trees, Christmas cards , Christmas toys, Christmas hotel bookings, Christmas Bar Bookings,, Food Items and many more. Apart from this people used to browse money sending sites like western union, Moneybookers and will search for different postal sites to send money and Christmas gifts to their beloved. Once I have read a survey in Time Magazine regarding the most crowded month on the internet and the surveyed month was the month of December so one should take benefit from this month by adopting the below mentioned techniques.

• Think about working as an affiliate marketer in this month because you can easily sell a lot of items in this month without making enough effort.
• Try to build your own page on the internet and affiliate your page with most of the above mentioned Christmas product selling sites to increase back links on your page.
• Use Google trends to search for the best searched keywords in this month related to Christmas and make your own choice depending upon the location in which you are located for the selection of product for e-marketing.
• Try to write different Christmas related articles on different platforms and forums to increase your own page recognition on Google.
• Use different social networks, blogs and forums for your Christmas product marketing.
• Invite different people to various Christmas groups and networks created by you to attract them to buy product from you which you are selling as a merchant or as an affiliate.
• Try to organize your search in terms of age, sex and location to best sell your Christmas product.
• After getting affiliated with top Christmas product selling sites, post various jobs on craigslist, elance, oDesk and hire more people that work with you on commission basis and help you in selling your affiliated products. In this way you can earn maximum instead of restricting yourself up to your own effort for selling.

This article is my introductory article in which I have just highlighted the major ways of earning online in the month of Christmas, the rest you find in the upcoming articles.

Please give your feedback. I need it!!!!!

Merry Christmas

RIGOR VS RELEVANCE

The Debate for rigor vs. relevance is perhaps the most important and older debate in academic history. There is always a gigantic gap between rigor and relevance which need to be condensed. Firstly let me define what rigor is as rigor is generally the easier of the two terms to define and describe but it has no value without relevance. Rigor is defined as the notch to which a work follows prescribed procedures for conducting research and producing results whereas on the other hand “something is relevant to a task if it increases the probability of accomplishing the goal which is implied by task.”(Hjorland & Sejer Christensen, 2002).Now inorder to make this debate more effective I just want to highlight some points to mentioned the interdependent relationship between rigor and relevance. Thomas and Tymon (1982) suggested that unless the work findings are actionable to practice that Practioners will not consider it relevant. Drawing from Kilman in 1979 (Kilman, 1979) suggested that the high controllability are considered superior in terms of rigor but unfortunately these conditions yield data and results that are of weaker external validity or applicability in the Practioners world. Operational strength concerns the ability of the Practioners to implement action implications of a theory by manipulating its causal variables (Thomas and Tymon, 1988). Timelines concern the necessity that a theory be available to practitioner in time to use it to deal with problems (Thomas and Tymon, 1982). An interesting element of this debate is the dipolar nature in which it is directed. An uninformed reader might assume, based on the writings that the terms are mutually exclusive, yet this is far from the truth of the preferred outcome. (Neil et. Al (2001). Few business people waste their time with academic research as there is no relevance to Practitioners. Academics are two to three years behind the Practioners (Murray Jennex ISWorld 2/11/02).Research generally is not directly applicable to practitioners as stated by Murray Jennex. Research should be lead using the classical scientific method of experimentation and observation. Applied Research is the best use of the academic community’s time and should produce results directly applicable to immediate PR actioner’s concern. (Paper 2002). Most of the Research is being done for career enhancement. An examination of the top ranked journals finds that the majority customarily accept the “basic” research articles using scientific methods for design, collection and analysis of data (Cabell and English 2000). A Practitioner’s willingness is to ask a professor that just published a major study how can that be used to improve their operation or save their company time or dollar. If academic is the source of knowledge, why don’t academics do a better job of sharing that knowledge outside our own community. The rigor should be synched with relevance so that with the results of the basic research in academics practitioners can derive applicable results by applying that knowledge. Practitioners are realistic while academics are idealistic. Speed of change is critical to practitioners. Practitioners cannot afford to wait several years to determine if one variable is more applicable to their situation than another. The vast majority of both academics and practitioners should operate under system that is reward based. Rigor has no value without relevance. Evaluation Research applies practical as well as theoretical criteria to the assessment of an intervention in an organization. If academic papers are difficult to read, regardless of the content, if they are not relevant, they are of no use. Rigor should address problems, challenges or concerns of a perceived audience. Rigor should be practically applicable to the target audience. Rigor should align its style, its language of communication, to suit the needs and pre-requisites of the intended audience. To achieve relevance of rigor, the style of rigor must be decided through the needs and the requirements that follow from the apprehensions of the intended audience. It is important to be specific about and to know the target audience and their concerns, which relevance.Benbasat & Zmud (1999) claim that the relevance to practice in IS research published in the top journals is limited. In their view, academic research published in IS do not produce knowledge that IS professionals can apply in their daily work, do not address problems or challenges that are of concerns to IS professionals, do not focus on current technological and business issues, and is not accessible to IS professionals. There are five explanations to why this happens, the first one is that IS researchers as well as editors of academic outlets have tended to emphasize the importance of rigor over relevance in order to establish IS as an academic discipline and to gain respect from other, more established academic discipline. Keen (1991) argues that until relevance has been established, rigor is irrelevant. Thus rigor does not create relevance, which in turn means that the quality of a scientific work is not solely on rigorous use of methods, which however often seems to be the case. Second, there has not been a success within the community in terms of developing cumulative traditions, which makes it difficult to develop, evaluate, agree upon and maintain strong theoretical models that have the powers to influence practice. Third the dynamism of the technological environment, where researchers tend to pursue rather than lead practice, make many articles published in the leading IS journals outdated before they reach the reader as they report on new technology already accepted or rejected by the users. Fourth, IS researchers tend to be insufficiently exposed to the practical context of IT-related use and business management. Fifth, the institutional environment, including academic patronage systems and power structures, do not encourage a search for relevance as it does that for rigor.

Hello EveryOne (Specially to My Students Hi Guys!!!!!)

I know i haven’t informed you all of me leaving IBIT but what can i do i have to explore myself and my capabilities and believe me i will not disappoint you all. I am really missing you all thats why i have developed this blog site just to be in touch with you and to find excellent ways for you to earn on internet.